My only full fare these days (out of my own pocket) are with QR! Travelling on CX, I take what ever discounts they are offering out there! But they have limited 'cheap' places to get full fare J and F !

Ballistic
 

Recent fares from my travel agent in Hong Kong on CX

HK- Singapore return HKD 19000 plus surcharges !
yet if you fly HK- Bkk HKD 4,650 and buy BKK Sin in BKK HKD 4400, then you do the same trip for HKD 9k all on CX metal

Calling the Consumer Council - do you read these posts ?

HKG to Da Nang on CX HKD 14500 !

HK to Tampa HKD 83k ! (CX HK - Lax-HKG J the rest in economy on AA

I think they are politely asking people to fly other carriers at a reasonable price
or part with their money willy nilly

A friend who is a doctor met a CX manager at a party recently
The person said --- job was to encourage customer brand loyalty 'so that CX could charge them more for their product'

CX to Danang?

I don't entirely understand what is so surprising about the HKG-SIN via BKK bit. This is simply the reverse of what happens when we fly long-haul to JFK from TPE. From HKG, the trip is HK$62,000. From TPE, the trip is HK$29,000. Different points of origin, different markets, what's so surprising? Just like KAL: HKG --> ICN --> ATL is less than ICN --> ATL.

For the HKG to TPA bit, I thought it was common knowledge that travelling on code-shares in the US after long-haul is a rip. Just buy a ticket to LAX through CX and buy another ticket through AA or whoever. We did this for our Xmas trip. TPE via HKG --> JFK --> MCO (Orlando), ATL (Atlanta) --> LGA, JFK --> HKG. Without miles, two people, round trip (J intl on CX, Y dom on AA) = HK$64,000

And to answer the OP, we always purchase 1 D fare and then get a companion fare with 95,000 miles. You can't beat HK$15,000 roundtrip business from TPE/HKG to JFK.

That is what I did too - any idea if that is simply a temporary promotion or is that how it will be for a while?

We bought the tickets back in May because I was afraid the pricing would go up, but the sale is still there even for the holiday season.

We're planning on doing Australia next year sometime through the same method. TPE is about 60% cheaper for both Sydney and Brisbane and you can never spend too many nights in Taipei eating...

Agree, it's just the concept of nonstop vs. flights with connections pricing. In most cases, nonstop will always be the most expensive.

Can you buy 713 HKG - BKK and then 713 BKK - SIN and have both BP's issued in HKG? Has anyone done this before?

That said, it seems like a lot of hassle to avoid sitting in Y for a 3 hour flight (and that's from someone who hates Y.). Turns the HKG-SIN leg into 6 hours, and the SIN-HKG into 6.5 hours.

agreed! I've contemplated it a few times but in the end a direct flight always opened up (thank goodness!!)
Having said that, tomorrow I am flying ICN - TPE on one PNR and then TPE - SIN on another so that the return ends up in TPE in a couple of weeks for a direct return trip to NRT at 27,000 NTD rather than 105,000 via HKG to HND! I felt quite smug for the last few days as ICN-TPE-HKG on 421 was 74A - predictably today it became 777 ...its a game :)

I don't mind CX charging more if the services are up to par to what they are charging.

seems like to me what's gonna happen next is HKG-JFK-HKG for HK$30000 and they can still pull it off as a mistake fare.....

Could be via SGN with onward connection by VN.

Totally agree!!! and HK$62,000 had 1-stop at YVR and non-stop say HK$84,000 >< CX provides very competitive discount Business Class fares ex-TPE, eg. TPE-SIN $530 (ex-HKG $2,436), TPE-SYD $1,917 (ex-HKG $4,282), TPE-LHR $2,953 (ex-HKG $5,768) and TPE-LAX $2,633 (ex-HKG $5,987).

No offense, but I think it's kind of a silly question. There isn't much point in asking whether people pay full fare Y coach fares on personal travel either, is there? Typically a leisure traveler will buy the cheapest available fare for the class of service they desire. It's infrequent that a leisure traveler would need to buy-up to a full fare in order to get what is really the only benefit of a full fare -- refundability/flexibility.

Even business travelers have discovered that in most cases they're better off buying the lowest available, even if it's restricted, because lowest available plus 2-3 change fees still often costs less than an unrestricted fare.

The other issue with the question is the apparent hang-up on the letter of the fare class, specifically "J". In many if not most instances, C and D inventory fares are fully changeable/refundable. If that's the case, then there's no reason anyone would pay for a J class fare if the C or D inventory was available. Only on a very full flight would one be forced up to a J fare. Or perhaps a business traveler has a corporate-negotiated discount fare that books into J but is less expensive than the published C/D fares.

Oh, and in terms of "F", if I made US$1-2 million a year or more in salary I would probably pay for full F out-of-pocket for vacations. Even $25k x 2 for JFK-HKG isn't a ton of money on that kind of income. And there are plenty of people in major financial capitals like NYC or HKG that make that kind of money. Think bankers or hedge fund managers. I don't know whether they all value F over J at that point, or at what stage they're looking at private jet travel, but there probably is a modest market for leisure-based paid F travel.

CX to Danang
 

yes the quoted fare was via Ho Chi Minh and then Air Vietnam to Da Nang An alternative is Dragonair to Hanoi and Air Vietnam to Da Nang - same price.
Air Vietnam has promised a direct Da Nang HKG flight soon to cater for the golf enthusiasts.
At present there is only one International flight to Da Nang which is Silkair ex Singapore.